Patiala jail superintendent refuses to accept Rajoana's death warrant

Despite a Chandigarh court issuing him a contempt notice, the Patiala jail superintendent Tuesday again refused to accept the warrant of death for Babbar Khalsa terrorist Balwant Singh Rajoana.

“The Superintendent of Central Jail, Patiala today (Tuesday) pleaded with the Additional Sessions Judge Chandigarh that he was ‘unable and disabled in law’" to accept warrants of death against Bhai Balwant Singh Rajoana and refused to accept the same," a Punjab government spokesman said Tuesday evening.

The Patiala jail superintendent told the Chnadigarh court that he was approaching "the next higher court for appropriate next step in the case”, the spokesman said.

Rajoana, sentenced to death in the 1995 assassination of then Punjab chief minister Beant Singh, is to hang as scheduled on March 31, the court ruled.